Computing devices, referred to herein sometimes as service nodes, can be coupled together in a network, such as the Internet, to define what is commonly referred to as a service grid. A service grid can be established to provide access to the group of computing services via a common services entry point. In operation, a conventional service grid can match a service associated with a service node to a service request responsive to a request for that service.
Even though the different service nodes in the grid may provide similar services, there may exist differences in the way in which particular service nodes communicate with other service nodes. For example, newer version service nodes introduced into the grid may include increased functionality which is unknown to older version service nodes. Therefore, the older version service nodes may be unable to communicate with the newer version service nodes and vice-versa. A conventional approach to this type of communication problem is to require each node to include the ability to convert communications between any of the versions in the grid. This approach may become intractable as the number of service nodes and number of existing versions in the grid increases.